Britain must abandon its "snobbish" attitudes to vocational training, ministers said yesterday as they unveiled plans to allow pupils as young as 14 to spend up to two days a week in the workplace learning a trade.

The education secretary, Charles Clarke, rejected suggestions that the extension of apprenticeship programmes to younger students amounted to a reintroduction of 11-plus style selection, insisting the new scheme would attract motivated and able pupils.

The launch of young apprenticeships for 14- to 16-year-olds is part of an overhaul of the 10-year-old modern apprenticeship programme, which will also see the removal of the age limit of 25 on joining the scheme. The "modern" tag will also be scrapped.

Ministers are seeking to boost the programme, which has suffered from low completion rates - only around one third of trainees finish their apprenticeships - and a reluctance by British employers to get involved in training despite complaining of low skills levels.

The relaunch, announced yesterday amid designer dresses in Selfridges department store in central London, will be accompanied by an advertising campaign to try to win over more businesses.

Plans to allow pre-GCSE pupils to leave the classroom for the workplace two days a week, on offer to 1,000 pupils from this September and expected to expand rapidly, were given a qualified welcome by head teachers.

David Hart, general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, said the scheme would help meet the needs of youngsters for whom "a pure academic diet is inappropriate", but warned that the apprenticeships must be of high quality to avoid becoming "a dumping ground for the disaffected".

John Dunford, of the Secondary Heads Association, warned that the programmes should not be for lower ability pupils, saying vocational qualifications had "for too long been regarded as inferior to academic grades".

The academic-vocational divide was a "bogus choice", the lifelong learning minister, Ivan Lewis, said, insisting that bright children would opt for the new scheme. Britain had to tackle its "uniquely snobbish attitudes to education and training", he said.

The young apprenticeship will be available to students initially in engineering, business administration and arts and media, with other sectors expected to follow.

Pupils will still have to study the core curriculum during their days in school, including English, maths, science and other required subjects such as key skills and citizenship, and will have to have reached expected minimum standards in numeracy and literacy to qualify for the apprenticeships.

They will not be paid for their job training, and details of training remain sketchy, though they could learn skills involved in television camera operation or car manufacture.

Mr Clarke said a vocational option could enthuse youngsters otherwise turned off education. He said: "This will be an exciting prospect for any pupil wanting to pursue industry specific vocational programmes on top of the core national curriculum."

The chancellor, Gordon Brown, jointly launching the revamped apprenticeships, said the scheme would help address Britain's skills gap and "aid the push towards our objective of full employment".

The government will have to work hard if it is to overcome reluctance by British employers to offer quality training, and address the concerns of parents and some in schools that vocational training represents a second-class option.

John Brennan, chief executive of the Association of Colleges, said: "If the government is to succeed in establishing vocational learning as a high quality alternative to the academic route, available to all young people, then they must tackle the problem of low employer interest and they must be prepared to invest equally in colleges."

An Equal Opportunities Commission report last week highlighted the fact that modern apprenticeships are starkly segregated by gender, with barely any female engineering, plumbing and construction trainees - a fact not addressed by the new package.

The Tories claimed the government was aiming to "shift the goalposts" to avoid missing its own target of at least 28% of young people joining the modern apprenticeship scheme by 2004. The latest figures show only 23% have signed up.